Host: The Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers
Name : [in Japanese]
Date : June 16, 2016 - June 17, 2016
Electricity storage technology in middle/large scale is indispensable to utilize sustainable energy efficiently. Regenerative fuel cell (RFC) system embedded polymer electrolyte membrane is one of the candidate, which has rather large specific energy density compering secondary batteries. However, slow switching between charge and discharge and low conversion efficiency are pointed out as disadvantages, and should be addressed. This study challenges to accelerate the switching and increase the efficiency by rising operation temperature. Experimental evaluation shows that 2 minutes is required at 80°C and several seconds is done at 105°C when operation turns from water electrolyzer to fuel cell, suggesting that rising temperature functions to accelerate the switching. Also, higher temperature operation in water electrolyzer increases the conversion efficiency as expected. However, the effect in the case of fuel cell could not be proven due to catalyst layer issue.
